I am interested in discussing some of the epithets of Gozer. Babylonian gods accrued many epithets over the centuries they were worshipped. Some described their functions. Others were due to the assimilation of neighboring gods. The Enuma Elish says of Marduk, “With fifty epithets the great gods called his fifty names, making his way supreme.” We only know several of Gozer’s epithets. What can we make of them?
Gozer is…
Gozer the Gozerian. This implies that “Gozerian” is a class of entities which includes Gozer. It could be a way of expressing Gozer’s singular nature, that Gozer is in a class of its own, and there is nothing else like it. But that is only one possibility. It may be that there were multiple Gozers in the Mesopotamian pantheon, and one of them–perhaps worshipped by the inhabitants of Gozeria, or some such place–was known as Gozer the Gozerian to distinguish it from the other Gozers.
Gozer the Traveler. The most obvious meaning here is that Gozer travels from its realm into the human realm, as it does during the climax of Ghostbusters. However, this would not be unusual to the Sumerians, who believed their gods visited every year. It could be an astronomical label, equating Gozer with a planet or comet that “travels” relative to the fixed stars. These omens could be associated with uncommon events like floods or earthquakes, which also ties into the Destructor epithet. Or, Traveler may refer to a myth in which Gozer has no fixed abode but travels about. This myth might reflect a reality in which Gozer was not the god of a city-state, but the god of an itinerant tribe.
Volguus Zildrohar. I have no idea what this mean. Volguus looks a little like a primitive Latin vulgus. Did Gozer enjoy a brief renaissance on the Italian peninsula? I doubt it.
Gozer the Destructor. This one is obvious. Gozer causes mass destruction. While Ivo Shandor thought Gozer would destroy the entire world, it’s obvious that its power (or at least its desire) did not extend that far. Many Shubs and Zuuls were roasted in the depths of the Sloar, sure, but the world didn’t end. It is not even clear how many Shubs and Zuuls were roasted, and how many survived. Key words used by Vinz Clortho are “rectification” and “reconciliation.” These imply that Gozer the Destructor’s goal was not destruction, but righting something that was wrong with humanity and bringing it back into the proper relationship with the gods.
I suspect Gozer was the god of a nomadic tribe of bandits, derisively called the Gozerians by the civilized people of Mesopotamia. They refered to the nomads’ god as “the Traveler,” since there was no fixed temple for it. The nomads would raid the cities, particularly when the cities were weakened due to natural disaster, and “Gozer” became a byword for destruction. “The Traveler” became “the Destructor.” Over time, the Gozerians settled and built a city, complete with the requisite ziggurat. Through trade, the cult of Gozer spread to the Hittites. By this time, there may have been distinct cults of “Gozer the Gozerian” and “Gozer the Traveler,” reflecting the divergence of the city-Gozerians and the nomadic Gozerians. But to much of the rest of the world, Gozer was still “the Destructor,” and that’s how it was assimilated into their pantheons. Over time, the Gozerian culture was lost, and Gozer survived only as a defeated enemy god in Sumerian and Babylonian writings.